


as gently as we can

by seventhstar



Series: a covenant with a bright blazing star [11]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alpha Katsuki Yuuri, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Regency, Getting to Know Each Other, Long-Haired Victor Nikiforov, M/M, Major Illness, Marriage of Convenience, Omega Victor Nikiforov, Recovery, Regency, Regency Romance, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-24
Updated: 2018-03-24
Packaged: 2019-04-07 14:32:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14082999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seventhstar/pseuds/seventhstar
Summary: “...and if he does not stop reading me Cowper, Makkachin, I will expire just to avoid having to hear any of more of his insipid verses.”Yuuri nearly walks facefirst into the door. He is beginning to hate this hallway; nothing good ever comes of lingering here outside the bedchamber door. He looks down at the well-loved volume of Cowper, and of all the poems he has read to Viktor with great feeling and greater embarrassment, and wonder if one can die of shame.[part of an ongoing series of fics, telling the story of poor and scandalous trademan's son viktor nikiforov's marriage of convenience to the reclusive lord katsuki]





	as gently as we can

**Author's Note:**

> finally, we have arrived at the romance. sort of. i hope you like this fake book because i wrote like 2k in excerpts of it. whoops.

“...and if he does not stop reading me Cowper, Makkachin, I will expire just to avoid having to hear any of more of his insipid verses.”

Yuuri nearly walks facefirst into the door. He is beginning to hate this hallway; nothing good ever comes of lingering here outside the bedchamber door. He looks down at the well-loved volume of Cowper, and of all the poems he has read to Viktor with great feeling and greater embarrassment, and wonder if one can die of shame.

“’The Castaway’ is his favorite poem, can you imagine?”

Makkachin barks in response.

Yuuri _likes_ ‘The Castaway’.

“I suppose it would be uncomfortable for him to read me love poetry, but I can’t say poetry about dying alone is doing anything to raise my spirits.”

Yuuri gently lays his head against the door.

“Sit, Makka. Good girl.”

Deciding that retreat is in order, Yuuri abandons all notion of Cowper and returns to the study, where he has been wrestling with the accounts. The steward appears to have kept three separate books simultaneously, and so far Yuuri has not been able to discern which are accurate, if any of them are. Not for the first time, Yuuri wishes he had a head for figures; it would serve him better than his weak nerves. On a shelf behind his overflowing desk are books: most of them are references regarding agriculture and livestock, but there is one book still wrapped in brown paper, just delivered from London.

Yuuri tucks it under his arm, goes to the kitchen to fetch a cup of fortified tea, and goes back upstairs. Having learned his lesson, he refrains from standing out in the hallway for any longer than necessary.

Viktor is lying on the pile of rugs in front of the chair, dressed in a pair of plain brown trousers and a patched white shirt. Instead of a cravat, he has left the neck of the shirt open and wound a length of plain fabric around his throat as a collar. The collar is stained with sweat. His hair is tied back with a leather thong. The whole effect is very ugly. Yuuri thinks he looks ravishing. Makkachin is sitting on Viktor’s legs while he exercises; Viktor bends at the waist, lifting his body off the rug until he is upright before flopping back onto the ground.

“Did you train her to do that?”

“I trained her to sit,” Viktor replies, panting. “Makkachin is a very smart dog, though. Sometimes I think she is cleverer than I am.”

“Oh, yes,” Yuuri agrees. Makkachin is very intelligent. Her only failing is that she likes Yuuri. He scratches behind her ears, and she yips at him before pouncing.

“Makkachin, no—down, girl—”

“That tickles,” Yuuri gasps as Makkachin licks him.

Viktor, lying on the floor, sighs dramatically. “Betrayed…”

“I can help,” Yuuri says. He holds out his hands, and after Viktor shrugs, puts them gingerly on his knees to hold them still. Viktor struggles upright again. His knees are warm, which is a nonsensical thing to fixate on; all living things are warm. _They are only knees,_ Yuuri thinks as he braces his weight against Viktor’s legs.

Viktor manages another ten or twelve repetitions before he groans and collapses back onto the floor. He pants, chest heaving. Yuuri can see a bead of sweat dripping across his forehead; it has rather a long way to go.

“I’m tired,” he says. “But the doctor has ordered I walk further today than I did yesterday…”

He sits up again, and Yuuri gives him the cup of tea after magicking it warm again. Viktor has managed in the past week to walk down the stairs on his own, though he has needed a long rest and help to get back up. He is able to get up and down the hallways on his own, though, and is able to dress and bathe himself.

“That is good, isn’t it?”

“I hate being inside when the weather is turning.” Viktor glances longingly at the open window.

“We could go outside and read,” Yuuri offers. Though he is impressed with Viktor’s progress, Dr. Lee has complained that he does not feel Viktor is giving his recovery sufficient effort. Their gardens are starting to become green again; perhaps that will be incentive for Viktor to push himself. “Not Cowper. Something you enjoy.”

“…you heard me.”

“We have other books,” Yuuri mutters. “Poetry, Shakespeare, anything you like. And this.” He holds up the package he brought from downstairs. “I ordered it while I was in town. I asked specifically for something suitable.”

“Oh?” Viktor extends a hand, and Yuuri gives him the book. He unwraps the paper to reveal the cover. “Oh.”

“What is it?”

Viktor turns the book so that Yuuri can read the cover. _Eros_ is written on the front in gold leaf.

Yuuri recoils; he has heard of this novel, but only because it was scandalous. Apparently there were fears that it would be read by well-bred omegas and lead them to fornication and ruin. Minako had read it and said, snorting, that it would certainly give maidens making their debuts _ideas._ Yuuri is not sure what those ideas are, nor does he want to know.

“Did you tell the bookseller you were reading to your husband?”

“Yes, but—”

“Possibly you gave him the impression our marital felicity was not what it should be?”

“I didn’t say that—”

“Ah. That would explain it.”

“We can read something else.”

“Why? I want to read this one.”

“But—” Yuuri flails inwardly. “It’s…” He trails off. He can hardly tell Viktor thinking about their marital felicity makes Yuuri both aroused and uncomfortable. It is not Viktor’s fault that he is so pretty. “As you wish.”

He suggests they go out of the house to read, and Viktor agrees. He changes into clean clothes, though they are as worn as the ones he has taken off, and comes back with his hair tucked into his shirt. Yuuri wonders what happened to all the finely made clothes Viktor wore before; perhaps he is merely not up to the rigors of dressing so carefully. It is not as if there is anyone here to see him. They walk slowly down the steps, past Yuuri’s study which he winces to even look at, and past Withers and the footman James, who are polishing the silver, to the front door.

“Here.” Yuuri holds the door while Viktor steps outside. The early spring sunlight is still cold, but Viktor tips his head up to meet it with a faint smile. “In the garden?”

“Yes.”

Overhead the sky is blue, and the air for once still. Yuuri clears a few fallen leaves off of a bench and help Viktor seat himself. He is framed on either side by young trees, which have begun to put out small buds. The flowerbeds, though carefully tended, are mostly bare; there are only a few green shoots, poking out of the dirt.

Yuuri sits down beside Viktor, leaving a generous distance between their thighs. He tugs magically on the branches of a nearby tree until they cast a shadow over Viktor to shield him from the sun. He opens the book to the first page, and after a moment, Viktor slides down the bench until he can peer at the words. Yuuri stares down at the space between them, at how scant it looks, and then clears his throat. He begins to read.

_It is a truth universally acknowledged that an unmarried omega with a large dowry has finer prospects than a poor one with a measly five hundred pounds. Therefore, when Miss Gertrude Glastonbury inherited fifty thousand pounds from a distant relative, it ignited all her romantic hopes and dreams, which had begun to wither over the past year when her options for marriage consisted of her rakish cousin and the feeble-minded second son of the local country squire. Miss Glastonbury’s father was beside himself, as were her five omega sisters, for they all knew that she might now make a Fine Match. Her mother, though ignorant of the workings of the omega mind, knew that this meant he would soon have one less mouth to feed, and was grateful._

_Gertrude’s aunt, who had previously ignored her brother when he married a simple clergyman, heard the news and wrote to him immediately. She knew that to bring out a simple country girl, with good manners and a large portion, would make her the most wanted guest in town and open to her doors that had always been closed. She promised to spare no expense in rigging the girl out and bringing her into society in style. Gertrude had scarcely grasped the enormity of her good fortune before she was on her way to London in her aunt’s coach, dreaming of all the handsome alphas who she might meet…_

**Author's Note:**

> please comment!


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